Download and install: Can't unzip or extract .xz

Support & Help Requests Raspberry Pi
#1

Hi, Am I doing something stupid?

Trying to download mate for raspi 3. Since my RasPi doesn’t have an OS yet, I’m doing it on mac or windows. I just want to get an image file or iso that I can then put on a microSD etc. to load onto the pi, but can’t even get past the first step.

I go to downloads page and get the img.xz file for raspi, but can’t extract/unzip it.

None of these worked:

–unarchiver, keka, 7-zip, archive utility, and every command I could find on terminal
–both macOs and windows 7
–downloading in multiple browsers and via torrent

Thanks.

#2

7-zip should be able to extract from a .xz file.

If it doesn’t, then install xz on your OSX.

http://macappstore.org/xz/

That should allow you to extract the img file.

#3

I find peazip works well for Windows
Derek

#4

The command to decompress with xz would be:

unxz ubuntu-mate-16.04.2-desktop-armhf-raspberry-pi.img.xz

See here for more information:

https://ubuntu-mate.org/raspberry-pi/

And the man page for xz is located here:

https://linux.die.net/man/1/xz

#5

Thanks everyone who responded! Appreciate it.

Sadly, neither 7-zip nor xz worked. xz says “file format not recognized”. I’ll try peazip now.

#6

Update: Peazip and xz both worked!

The trick was to download the file again from the website every single time I tried to unzip it. But for example if I downloaded it and it failed with 7-zip, then unzipping the same file with peazip or xz didn’t work even though 7-zip didn’t seem to modify the file.

But once I downloaded the file again, then used peazip, it worked. Same: if I downloaded it again and then ran xz.

It was always the same file from the same site, and the download appeared to work fine every time, so I think somehow the failed try (regardless of program) was corrupting it.

Thanks again all. This was really bugging me and am gald be able to get started.

3 Likes
#7

There are warnings inplaces about trying to unzip/unpack before you use the ‘proper’ tool - presumably because of this sort of thing. I, personally, haven’t had the problem (yet)
Derek

#8

Glad it’s working :thumbsup: I’d also say it’s likely the file was getting corrupt somehow – whether by transit, a program, or the storage medium it was being saved to.

There is a way to check a download is bit-by-bit perfect by performing a SHA256 checksum. The download page lists one like this:

dc3afcad68a5de3ba683dc30d2093a3b5b3cd6b2c16c0b5de8d50fede78f75c2

If you’re using Mac/Linux, you can do that right in from the terminal:

sha256sum ubuntu-mate-16.04.2-desktop-armhf-raspberry-pi.img.xz

They should match - and should help identify corrupt downloads in future. :slight_smile:

1 Like
#9

That’s really helpful, thanks! I will definitely make use of that in the future.

#11

drop the .xz right onto Etcher and it will flash to your SD card correctly. Etcher is an SD card flash from an ISO type file.